Skip to main content

Updated June 9, 2019

Family name origins & meanings

  • English and Scottish : nickname for someone with fair or prematurely white hair, from Middle English whit ‘white’ + heved ‘head’.
  • Irish (Connacht) : erroneous translation of Ó Ceanndubháin ‘descendant of the little black-headed one’ (see Canavan), as if from Gaelic ceann ‘head’ + bán ‘white’.
  • Translated form of German Weisshaupt (see Weishaupt) or Weisskopf (see Weiskopf).

Join the Family

Your partner in parenting from baby name inspiration to college planning.

Subscribe